It is well known that water is composed of individual water molecules that associate with others through hydrogen bonding. From statistical and mechanical analyses of water, it was found that liquid water may be regarded as a mixture of hydrogen bonded clusters and unbonded molecules. Considini, D. M., Editor-in-Chief, Encyclopedia of Chemistry, Van Nostrand Reinhold Co., New York (1984). Thereafter it was shown that water can be characterized by five species: unbonded molecules, tetrahydrogen bonded molecules in the interior of a cluster; and surface molecules connected to the cluster by 1, 2 or 3 hydrogen bonds. Id. Under normal conditions, natural clustering of water molecules is short lived and the cluster size is unpredictable. Water which has been treated to have a more ordered and stable clustering of water molecules, shall be referred to herein as "microclustered" water.
"The presence of dissolved solutes causes the structure and properties of liquid water to change." Lehninger, A. L. Biochemistry p. 44 (1975). For example, when sodium chloride is dissolved in water, water molecules surround the sodium and chloride ions to produce ion hydrates. The resulting geometry of the water molecules differs from that of the prior clusters of hydrogen-bonded water molecules. The water molecules become more highly ordered and regular in structure. The addition of sodium chloride to microclustered water effects the same result. Thus, the sodium chloride may be said to function as a "template" for the change. As used herein, "template" refers to any material which is used with microclustered water to create a molecular structure therein for the achievement of specific results.
Much of microcluster chemistry has focused on the ionization of metals and the formation of small metal cluster groups which elicit a significant change in chemical behavior. Such research is exemplified by Weiller, B. H., Bechtold, P. S., Parko, E. K., et al., The Reactions of Iron Clusters with Water. Journal of Chemical Physics, Vol. 91, Note. 8:4714-27 (Oct. 15, 1989); and Yang, X. L., Castleman, A. W., Large Protonated Water Clusters, Journal of The American Chemical Society, Vol. III, Note 17:6845-46 (Aug. 16, 1989). However, microcluster technology has also been concerned with the interaction of various solutes, such as proteins, nucleic acid and cellular material.